Blessed are the Peacemakers (Trump and Putin)

Summary

---

Pod Save America: "Blessed are the Peacemakers (Trump and Putin)"

August 8, 2025 | Hosts: Jon Favreau, Jon Lovett, Tommy Vietor

---

Overview

In this episode, the Pod Save America team dives deep into the recent Trump-led diplomatic overtures on the Russia-Ukraine war, specifically Trump's meetings with Vladimir Putin in Alaska and the subsequent summit with Ukrainian President Zelenskyy and European leaders in D.C. The hosts analyze the symbolic and practical ramifications of these meetings for global security, U.S.-European relations, and American democracy. Discussion also covers domestic fallout, including ICE operations in D.C., the ongoing redistricting wars, and Gavin Newsom's emerging political tactics. The episode features an in-depth interview with former Ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, about her resignation and congressional run in protest of the current administration’s foreign policy.

---

Key Discussion Points

1. Trump, Putin, and the Ukraine Peace Talks

Alaska Summit & White House Meeting (01:44–13:16)

• Trump rolled out the red carpet for Putin, culminating in chummy optics: “Putin was even seen laughing, so that’s cool.” (02:23)
• No ceasefire or major concessions announced; press largely shut out of the proceedings.

Notable Quote:

"It does seem like a win-win for Putin here, which is either Trump pushes Zelenskyy to give Putin everything he wants, or Trump gets annoyed at Putin and just throws his hands up ... which is also a win for Putin." – Jon Favreau (07:54)

• Trump now proposes a security guarantee for Ukraine, dropping prior insistence on a pre-negotiation ceasefire.
• European leaders are forced into superficial diplomacy, largely to stroke Trump's ego and avoid open conflict (09:00–10:19).

Media Optics and Global Reactions (10:43–17:39)

• Visuals of Trump applauding Putin and denying press access are highlighted as damaging, especially in light of Ukrainian suffering.

Memorable Moment:

“Imagine you’re Ukrainian ... And then tens of thousands of Ukrainian children were kidnapped ... and then ... Trump literally rolls out the red carpet [for Putin].” – Tommy Vietor (10:52)

• Guest commentary on how leaders must essentially "flirt" with Trump rather than engage in real diplomacy.

Zelenskyy, Fashion, and the Press (17:11–19:41)

• The MAGA ecosystem fixates on Zelenskyy's wardrobe, trivializing Ukraine's dire situation.

Notable Quote:

“Zelensky, you look fabulous in that suit.” – Donald Trump, mocked in press pool (17:29)

• U.S. media fails to challenge Trump’s exaggerated claims about peacemaking or deliver any real pushback.

---

2. Authoritarian Instincts, Democracy, and Trump’s “Admiration” for Strongmen

Trump’s Preferences and Psychology (15:14–16:54)

• Trump’s preference for “great men” and authoritarian rule—Xi, Putin, Netanyahu, Modi—over democratic coalition-building.
• Insights into why Trump’s personality clashes with the dignified resolve of leaders like Zelenskyy.

Notable Quote:

“What matters to Trump is that he’s a tough guy ... he respects that and he doesn’t respect Zelenskyy.” – Jon Favreau (15:54)

Disregard for Press, Elevation of Strongman Tactics (13:21–14:50)

• Repeated instances where Trump shields Putin from tough questions and avoids confrontation over war crimes.

---

3. Election Integrity, Mail Ballots, and Trump’s Democratic Erosion

Mail Ballot Disinformation and “Jokes” about Postponing Elections (21:35–28:50)

• Trump parrots Putin’s claims about U.S. elections being "rigged" due to mail-in voting and floats the idea of elections being postponed during wartime.

Notable Quote:

“Let me just say—three and a half years from now ... if we happen to be in a war with somebody, no more elections.” – Donald Trump (22:23)

• The hosts dissect constitutional constraints: legislatures (not the President) run federal elections.
• High concerns about Trump’s willingness to test and exploit every institutional weakness for political gain.

Memorable comment:

“He continues to try to go for the maximalist positions and then he sees what he can get.” – Jon Favreau (28:50)

---

4. ICE and “Law & Order” Stunts in D.C.

National Guard & ICE Deployments (31:35–39:59)

• Trump's deployment of National Guard and ICE agents in D.C.'s tourist districts, described as a law-and-order stunt for media optics.
• Agents focus on immigrants, the homeless, minor violations—visibly failing to address violent crime in high-incidence neighborhoods.
• Multiple humorous asides on dildos being used as protest objects and the absurdity of the enforcement.

Memorable Moment:

"Mine." "We're taking America back, baby." – ICE agent in viral video (32:36)

• Hosts link this spectacle to authoritarian precedent, warning about normalization and risk of true martial-law scenarios.
• Democratic leaders' weak response—labeling the operation a "stunt" or "distraction”—is critiqued as insufficiently substantive.

---

5. Redistricting Wars: Texas, California, and Newsom’s Political Strategy

Texas Democrats & Newsom’s Response (47:11–51:38)

• After walk-outs, Texas Democrats concede, allowing Republicans to gerrymander for a GOP House edge.
• California Governor Newsom counters with a tit-for-tat plan to add Democratic seats if other states gerrymander first—pending a state ballot initiative in November.
• Hosts debate the mechanics, risks, and perceptions of partisan redistricting as a defensive measure.

Meta-Political Analysis: Reform, Messaging, and Hypocrisy (51:38–54:00)

• Discussion about the long-term damage of this “gerrymander wars” moment to messaging around democracy and reform.
• Recognition that both parties are now entangled, but that Democrats pursued national gerrymandering bans (that passed the House, but failed in the Senate).

---

6. Gavin Newsom’s Social Media & Meme Strategy

Meme Wars (56:01–62:51)

• Newsom’s press office launches a parody campaign on social media, mimicking Trump-style aggressive messaging with humor and AI-generated images (e.g., "Gavin Newsom being supported by the angel of Hulk Hogan" (56:11)).
• Republicans and even some Democratic strategists criticize the strategy as unserious; hosts argue it is clever, disruptive, and successfully riling the opposition.

Notable Quote:

“It's not resistance lib version of a Trump tweet. They really are doing a good job of getting the voice.” – John Lovett (56:51)

• Discussion of attention as the primary currency in politics and the need to “take attention” to win in today’s media environment.

---

Interview: Bridget Brink, Former Ambassador to Ukraine (65:48–85:40)

Key Segments:

Brink’s Take on Meetings & Security Guarantees (66:00–73:37)

• Stresses that any peace deal must start with real security guarantees for Ukraine.
• Skeptical that mere statements from Putin or non-NATO security guarantees would be credible.

Quote:

“Any diplomatic negotiation with Russia ... has to make sure that we don't give away things in advance ... and trust but verify. He lies, he agrees to things and then violates those agreements over and over and over again.” – Bridget Brink (67:51)

On Trump’s Foreign Policy and Resigning in Protest (71:51–78:27)

• Brink resigned because she saw the Trump administration “appease Putin” and respond to Russia on Putin’s terms.
• Argues U.S. should leverage sanctions and frozen assets, not just taxpayer money, in pressing Russia.

Ukrainian & European Perspective on Red-Carpet Putin Diplomacy (75:54–78:57)

• Ukrainians “shocked and in disbelief” at the U.S. position and the apparent capitulation to Putin.

Decision to Run for Congress (82:54–85:27)

• Brink: “I could not change it from the inside ... The only way I thought to change it was to step out and try to change it in a different way.”

---

Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• Trump, hot mic:
  “I think he wants to make a deal for me ... As crazy as it sounds.” (04:37)
• Tommy Vietor:
  “Putin just knows he can manipulate Trump with a little bit of flattery, a little bit of shitting on Joe Biden.” (07:46)
• John Lovett:
  “Diplomacy is about national interests, but they all come here knowing ... they have to appeal to Trump’s ego. That’s not diplomacy, that’s flirting.” (09:38)
• Bridget Brink:
  "We should not accept any of Putin's historical justifications for why he started this war in Ukraine ... Ideally it would be something as ironclad as NATO, but it could be something lesser ... but we would need to be a part of it." (73:37)
• Jon Favreau (on mainstream Democratic messaging):
  “In real life ... ‘it’s a distraction from tariffs’—you sound like a fucking moron.” (39:32)
• John Lovett (on Newsom’s meme strategy):
  “We don’t get attention anymore. You have to take it ... and this is taking attention.” (62:46)

---

Thematic Summary

• Global Diplomacy & Authoritarian Drift:
  Trump’s approach is recasting U.S. foreign policy to serve his ego, undermining traditional democratic alliances and empowering autocrats.
• Domestic Institutions Under Siege:
  The episode repeatedly flags a “red sirens” level of concern at Trump’s disregard for election norms, his flirtation with postponing elections, and his growing comfort with strongman tactics at home.
• Failure of Democratic Messaging:
  Critiques the tendency among Democrats to deflect rather than confront new challenges, especially around crime, immigration, and attacks on democracy.
• Emergence of Aggressive Dem Counter-Tactics:
  Newsom’s embrace of meme warfare and California’s gerrymandering retaliation highlights a new willingness to “fight fire with fire.”
• Personal Stakes for Public Servants:
  Bridget Brink’s interview lays bare the personal and professional costs experienced by career diplomats under the current administration’s approach.

---

Useful Timestamps

• White House/Putin Analysis: 01:44–17:39
• Election/Russia Democracy Disintegration: 21:35–28:50
• ICE/National Guard Operations: 31:35–39:59
• Redistricting Wars: 47:11–54:00
• Newsom & Memes: 56:01–62:51
• Bridget Brink Interview: 65:48–85:40

---

This episode is dense with both substance and sharp, on-the-fly critique—reflective of the hosts’ irreverent and incisive style. For listeners not caught up, the big picture is clear: at home and abroad, norms are being broken, and the stakes are high, but the game isn’t over—and neither side is backing down.

Transcript

[Jon Favreau]

Today's presenting sponsor is Simplisafe. Home security politics is making everyone feel on edge. Can't imagine why. That's why having proactive control over your home safety is huge. SimpliSafe doesn't just react to a break in. It actively works to prevent it.

[John Lovett]

Wow.

[Jon Favreau]

And you know who actively has worked to prevent a break in with Simplisafe?

[John Lovett]

I have. That's me.

[Jon Favreau]

This guy right here sitting next to me.

[John Lovett]

I set up a Simplisafe. It was easy to do, works right out of the box. And you customize it for your home, you install it or you can have them install it for you, but I did it myself. Incredibly easy. Takes just a few minutes. Everything works. Everything works really well. Well. And it looks good. And the customer support is great. The app is great. It's just a great simple system that gives you peace of mind.

[Jon Favreau]

Most security systems only take action after someone breaks in too late. SimpliSafe's new Active Guard Outdoor protection helps stop break ins before they happen. If someone's lurking, agents talk to them in real time, turn on spotlights and can call the police. Proactively deterring crime before it starts. Named best home security system of 2025 by CNET. 4 million plus Americans trust SimplySafe. It's ranked number one in customer service by Newsweek and USA Today. Monitoring plans start around a dollar a day, 60 day money back guarantee. No contracts, no hidden fees. Visit simplisafe.com cricket to claim 50% off a new system with a professional monitoring plan and get your first month free. That's simplisafe.com crooked there's no safe like simplisaf. Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.

[John Lovett]

I'm John Lovett.

[Tommy Vietor]

Tommy Vithor.

[Jon Favreau]

Welcome back, Tommy.

[Tommy Vietor]

Thank you.

[Jon Favreau]

Good to be here. We missed you.

[Tommy Vietor]

I missed you guys.

[Jon Favreau]

Well, we got a big show for today. Republican governors are sending more troops to D.C. iCE says the quiet part out loud. Texas Democrats have gone home. Newsom is out trolling Trump. And then Tommy talks to former US Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink about the Russia Ukraine meetings over the last few days and why she decided to resign from the State Department after decades of service to run for Congress in Michigan. But let's start with the big White House meeting Monday between Trump, Zelenskyy and European leaders to discuss a possible deal that would end the war that began with Putin's invasion of Ukraine. The talks were a follow up to Trump's meeting with the Russian president in Alaska on Friday where Trump quite Literally rolled out the red carpet for Putin and invited him for a one on one ride in the presidential limo where they were all smiles. Putin was even seen laughing, so that's cool. The meeting ended with no announcement of a ceasefire or Russian concessions or really much of anything. They didn't even take questions from the press. The Monday meeting with Zelenskyy and the Europeans seemed to go much better than the Ukrainian President's last trip to the White House, where he was kicked out early after Trump and J.D. vance lost their shit in the Oval Office. Zelenskyy said this was the best meeting yet. And there's been vague talk about the US joining Europe and some kind of a security guarantee for Ukraine as part of any peace deal, though the Kremlin again rejected the presence of NATO troops in Ukraine afterwards. Trump has also dropped his demand for a ceasefire before negotiations take place, which Ukraine and Europe very much want. And he also seems quite bought into the idea that Putin's just a nice guy who genuinely wants peace.

[Tommy Vietor]

He loves peace.

[Jon Favreau]

Just loves peace.

[Tommy Vietor]

Peaceful. Dude.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. What are you gonna do?

[Tommy Vietor]

That's why you.

[Jon Favreau]

Here's some of what we heard from Trump on Monday.

[Donald Trump]

The six or so wars that we stopped, we haven't had a ceasefire. And so I don't know that it's necessary. You can do it through the war, but it would be. I like the cease fire. From another standpoint, you immediately stop the killing. But I believe a peace agreement at the end of all of this is something that's very attainable and it can be done in the near future. President Putin agreed that Russia would accept security guarantees for Ukraine. And this is one of the key points that we need to consider, and we're going to be considering that at the table also, like, who will do what. Essentially, I'm optimistic that collectively we can reach an agreement that would deter any future aggression against Ukraine. And I actually think there won't be. I think that's even overrated, largely overrated. But we're going to find out, and I think that the European nations are going to take a lot of the burden, we're going to help them, and we're going to make it very secure. I think he wants. I think he wants to make a deal for me. You understand that, as crazy as it sounds. Just sit down.

[Jon Favreau]

That last part was Trump caught on a hot mic. Hot mic saying he really thinks Putin wants to make a deal, as crazy as it sounds.

[Tommy Vietor]

For me.

[Jon Favreau]

So. For me, for me, for me. Yeah. Right before we started recording, Trump posted a truth I never know how to say it.

[Tommy Vietor]

What do we call them? Tim Miller calls them bleats.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, I just.

[Jon Favreau]

I wonder where bleats came from. I think it's just Tim's word for it.

[John Lovett]

There's an answer for all this. We do not need to refer to where these posts are, where they're coming from. He posted. He has a statement.

[Tommy Vietor]

He's a poster.

[John Lovett]

We can. We do. We can disaggregate it from the media.

[Jon Favreau]

I know that and I've been doing it, but it's like Trump posted a statement. Statement seems so, so much more formal for what those are.

[Tommy Vietor]

Well, yeah, I mean, he posted.

[Jon Favreau]

He's a poster, but you're right, we.

[Tommy Vietor]

Are doing PR for him. When we say truth, socially, I don't.

[Jon Favreau]

And I don't like to say truth.

[John Lovett]

I don't like to say X. I just. It was a post.

[Jon Favreau]

He tweeted.

[John Lovett]

He put it on the Internet. We all fucking saw it. It's a statement. It's just disgusting.

[Jon Favreau]

It's neither here nor there, for sure, but he is. He said he's arranging a meeting between Zelensky and Putin, one on one. And then after that, we'll hopefully get the trylat going with Zelensky, Putin and Trump.

[Tommy Vietor]

What the fuck?

[John Lovett]

Well, then that's when they go to the villa. They both go back and forth and he makes his decision.

[Jon Favreau]

Tommy, what do you think of the meetings today? Are you pro peace as much as Trump is pro peace and Putin is pro peace?

[Tommy Vietor]

I think I like peace. I mean, thorns and roses. Thorns or no roses. First. Yeah. As you said, they didn't scream at Zelensky for 45 minutes and kick him out of the White House. So we exceeded that low bar. It is good news that Trump is not ruling out a US role as part of a security guarantee. I still don't know what that means. In practice, it might be just us selling the European stuff, but it's, you know, he's not ruling it out. Zelensky's body language. I don't want to be that guy. But it's like. It seemed like he thought things went okay. Like, first, there was the first. The press conference was before the meeting with Trump, so you never know how things are going to go. But then they did the second pool spray with all the European leaders and Zelensky seemed kind of happy.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah.

[Tommy Vietor]

So it wasn't bad. But the bad news is, first, Trump, as he's mentioned, has abandoned the idea of getting a temporary ceasefire. He's abandoned the idea of putting in place secondary sanctions on Russia to pressure them into a deal. So that's bad. And the demands that Putin laid out in Alaska were still quite maximalist. I mean, it's. He wants Ukraine to fully see control of territory in eastern Ukraine that they aren't even occupying. So just like giving up more territory without military conflict in. In Donetsk, Putin is still talking about, like, the. He calls it the root causes of the war, which is code for this laundry list of stuff that means Ukraine putting limits on their military, Ukraine giving up territory, barring Ukraine from NATO, and then even walking back NATO expansion that occurred in, like, 19, the late 90s. And so, psychologically speaking, Putin also knows that Trump is just so desperate for a deal, any deal, so he can again call the Prime Minister of Norway and demand the Nobel Peace Prize, even though that is not, sir, how this works. It's like, five academics who make this determination, and he's asking to see the.

[John Lovett]

Nobel Peace Prize as manager is what he's doing.

[Jon Favreau]

And also not the manager.

[Tommy Vietor]

But Putin just knows, like, he can manipulate Trump with a little bit of flattery, a little bit of shitting on Joe Biden. And so I just.

[John Lovett]

We've.

[Tommy Vietor]

We've conceded all our leverage in these talks.

[Jon Favreau]

It does seem like a win. Win for Putin here, which is either he knows that Trump really wants the deal, and so either Trump pushes Zelensky to give Putin everything he wants, or Trump gets annoyed at Putin and annoyed at the whole thing and just throws his hands up and says, well, I'm done. You guys figure it out. Which is also a win for Putin because then he gets to do whatever he wants.

[John Lovett]

Pretty sweet. Yeah. All the old terms of the debate are when, for Putin, even the fact that you're engaging in the idea that this is some sort of negotiated peace between two countries, the way Trump talks about it, like, it's India and Pakistan or these long simmering enemies. If there's only someone who could come to bring the end to this conflict between these two warring parties when it was a war of aggression that Putin started. Yeah, I mean, we can get to the actual Putin meeting, but, like, what you're. What I noticed today is it feels like European leaders have figured out what Putin figured out a long time ago, which is there's just no equity in open conflict, defiance, any kind of disagreements. So you have, like. And there was, like, a decade of this, right? There was a decade of European leaders kind of. At first, they were in denial. They assumed that Trump was just posturing, and so he would still maintain the US's role in the world order. And then there was this sort of anger. It's played out with a decade of weird handshakes between him and Macron. And like all this Alpha dogging. And that was the meeting in February where Zelensky got too upset to not tell the truth in that setting, which cost him dearly. And there's just no equity and pride with Donald Trump. And so now all of these. Zelensky shows up, all these leaders have to fly in, and they have to say things like, we all want peace, and someone as smart and handsome and good as you, Mr. Trump, wants peace more than anyone. And this isn't.

[Jon Favreau]

And that's why I bought a bunch of Trump coin before I got.

[John Lovett]

Of course, of course. Here's my little crypto wallet. But what it amounts to, right, is like, diplomacy is about national interests, but they all come here knowing that in order to pursue the collective interests of these countries and the interests of a democratic order, they have to appeal to Trump's ego. And that's not diplomacy, that's flirting. They come. They have to fly to America to flirt on behalf of the world.

[Tommy Vietor]

Maybe hand stuff.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, a little. Yeah, under the table. That's why. Did you notice that Macron slid his chair a little bit closer? So then all those two shots, it was just the two of them, and it was like. It was like a tete. A tete between the two of them. I don't know what's going on under there. You know, Candice.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah.

[Jon Favreau]

All right.

[Tommy Vietor]

He's French.

[John Lovett]

And this is just a joke because I know that the Macrons are litigious.

[Jon Favreau]

But that was like.

[John Lovett]

That was what I. It felt to me like what we're seeing now is the culmination of a decade of leaders trying to figure out what to do with Trump, and that just. They can't be honest. And so it just means that we watch these public displays and because Trump says everything to everyone, and it depends on who we spoke with last, and these leaders can't exactly tell the truth anymore in front of them. We just have to wait. Right. Because the public stuff isn't nearly as important as it used to be.

[Jon Favreau]

What do you guys think of the. The Alaska summit? Trump called it a 10. What do you. What do you give it? 9. 9.5?

[John Lovett]

Maybe an Alaska 10?

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, it was an L. A 5.

[Jon Favreau]

I.

[Tommy Vietor]

Sorry. Yeah. Like, we both did the same. I was going to pivot. The point I wanted to make is just the first think about the images of that red carpet and the chummy walking down it and getting in the beast and laughing and Trump applauding him. And then imagine you're Ukrainian. So they've lost. Nearly 12,000 civilians have been killed. Tens of thousands of civilians have been wounded. An estimated 60,000 to 100,000 Ukrainian troops have been killed. Hundreds of thousands have been wounded or injured. 10 million Ukrainians are displaced either in Ukraine or throughout Europe or wherever else. And then tens of thousands of Ukrainian children were kidnapped, taken to Russia or taken to Russian occupied areas and put in reeducation camps. Hours, just in the hours before Zelensky or when Zelensky arrives in Washington. Russian attacks killed 14 people and wounded dozens of others. So just imagine like being in Kiev and watching that. It's like, it's not just that that Trump invites him to the US for talks, but literally rolls out the red carpet. Like, I'm, of course you, you, you do diplomacy with your enemies and you make peace deals with your enemies, but you didn't have to roll out the red carpet. And like he also just got completely steamrolled by Putin at his own press conference. It was really weird that Putin talked first. It was a US based press conference and they refused to take questions like on all the Barretts. It was a colossal failure. Trump told, I think it was the in house stenographer, right. It was Bret Baer. They did the interview on the plane on the way there. He was like, well, I'll know in two to three minutes if it's success because I get a ceasefire and I'll walk out. And he didn't get a ceasefire and he didn't walk out. But I like, it's just like the only reason the coverage was bad, but the only reason people weren't reacting even with like more direly, is that the expectation was that Trump might just completely sell out Ukraine to Putin in that moment and kind of end things there.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, the whole thing was sick. There were three different moments.

[Jon Favreau]

Sick. Not like cool.

[John Lovett]

No.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, it was dope.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, it was cap for sure. I can't even do them. I like, I'm so old, I just turned 43, I can't do it. But the.

[Tommy Vietor]

Happy birthday.

[Jon Favreau]

Happy birthday.

[John Lovett]

Hey, thanks. Thanks so much.

[Jon Favreau]

It's Leo's birthday today too.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, and that's great. I love dogs birthdays. People love hearing about dogs birthdays.

[Jon Favreau]

Sometimes I confuse yours and Leo's attack.

[John Lovett]

Three different. Your. Your wife FaceTime me.

[Jon Favreau]

She did, yeah.

[John Lovett]

I had a nice little FaceTime. Three different moments. What do we do?

[Tommy Vietor]

Two very good boys. You were saying about Vladimir Putin.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, Back.

[Jon Favreau]

That it's wild that everyone thinks they need to flatter Trump. What kind of a character is that?

[John Lovett]

Listen, I understand the man. I understand the man. So there are three different moments where Trump and Putin were in earshot of reporters who were shouting questions, and they were about Putin murdering civilians, about whether he's trustworthy, about whether he underestimated Ukraine. On the tarmac. He kind of does a little ear thing, like he's pretending not to hear. There's another moment when they're sitting for the meeting, and then the final moment in the press conference where they don't take any questions at all. And so you have an American president hosting a Russian autocrat who should want Putin to squirm, right? Who should want Putin to face tough questions from American journalists for his war crimes, for the kidnapping of these children, for the crushing of dissent, for all of it. But that would require Trump caring about the democratic values that Putin doesn't. And Trump respects power. He respects what. What autocracy represents. And so he enjoys reporters not being able to get their questions answered. And so the end result is Putin stands next to an American president lying about the causes of the war, throwing a sop to Trump's ego by saying, if he were president in 2022, none of this would have happened. All of it is just this. It's Trump getting snowed. But it also means we're all getting snowed by this fucking guy. Because instead of Trump being on our side with Europe, with. With Zelensky for these basic democratic values, he's got an ally. Because Putin figured out a decade ago what Europe just figured out this week was you just suck up to him, praise him, and you have him in the palm of your hands.

[Tommy Vietor]

Except the Europeans haven't gotten anything yet. You know what I mean? They're doing this sucking up, but I'm like, the jury's out if it's effective.

[John Lovett]

Oh, yeah, who fucking knows? But they've learned that they've gotten nothing for being honest, for being direct, for hoping that he would uphold the. The sort of. The basic American sort of position in Europe of defending NATO, defending against Russian aggression.

[Jon Favreau]

I mean, it seems pretty clear that if Trump were given the choice between a global international order that's sort of grounded in shared values of freedom and democracy and can be a little messy, and you gotta go to the United nations and negotiate all this stuff, or him and Xi and Putin and Netanyahu and. And Modi and both just. Just carving up the world and. And Then everyone ruling their own fiefdom with an iron fist, he would pick. He would pick the latter. Right. This is why he, like, he respects people who are authoritarian and who are. Strength. Doesn't matter how. How, like, successful the country is. Doesn't matter that, like, the Russian economy is shit. They. They weren't what they were. And, like, when they were the Soviet Union, like, that. None of that matters to Trump. What matters to Trump is that he's a. He's a tough guy who, you know, who's an authoritarian and rules with an iron fist. And so he respects that and he doesn't respect Zelensky because Zelenskyy is a president of a much smaller nation.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, there's also something like. There is just something so deeply psychological about it. Right. Because Trump, like Trump, is shameless. And so to be in his orbit, you must be shameless. But there's a. There's a. There's sort of a corollary to that, which is, like, how much pride makes him uncomfortable, like, how dignity makes him uncomfortable, because displays of pride and dignity are. Are an insult to him in some way, like some fundamental way. It makes him uncomfortable. And so that's what Zelensky. I think that's why there's such a kind of tension there with Zelensky, because Zelensky has pride and he has dignity on display, and Putin doesn't really. He has something else kind of his power. He has, like, kind of the. Kind of. Like the kind of whatever fragile power of, like, autocracy in him, but he doesn't have pride or dignity. And that. That works for Trump, because he doesn't either.

[Jon Favreau]

The meeting on Monday was. It might have been a little light on substance, but it was heavy on men's fashion talk. There were quite a few. And of course, in the Oval, Trump and Zelenskyy faced questions from just the most rigorous, tough press pool. Let's listen.

[Tommy Vietor]

President Zelensky, are you prepared to keep sending Ukrainian troops to their deaths for.

[Jon Favreau]

Another couple years, or are you going to agree to redraw the maps?

[Tommy Vietor]

A very touching letter from the First Lady. And the letter was hand delivered to President Putin.

[John Lovett]

President Zelensky.

[Jon Favreau]

Zelensky, you look fabulous in that suit.

[Donald Trump]

I said the same thing.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, you look good.

[Donald Trump]

I said the same thing. Yeah, I said someone that attacked you last time.

[Jon Favreau]

I remember that.

[Tommy Vietor]

I apologize to you.

[John Lovett]

Look, you look wonderful.

[Jon Favreau]

It's just so fucking. I feel so bad for Zelensky. It's like the guy is holding his country together by a thread. They are like, they've been invaded, they've been in war for three years. And like, you better dress up nice for Mr. Trump so they don't. So that Marjorie Taylor Greene's boyfriend doesn't yell at you.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, obviously the primary idiot here is Brian Glenn from something. Something Real, America's Voice, some shit like that. Like, he's Marjorie Taylor Greene's boyfriend, but, like, it wasn't just him. All the MAGA people were tweeting about his outfit today. Like this woman, Mary Margaret Olahan, the Daily Wire White House correspondent, tweeted, zelensky appears to have done his best to not wear a suit today. Along with the photo of Zelensky clearly wearing a suit. It's like, ma', am, do you have eyes? Like, what are you talking about? But that wasn't the extent of this stupidity. Like, Peter Doocy's question from Fox News, who actually, I think, has done, like, a pretty good job at some of these press avails in the past, was basically, Zelensky, are you going to continue to send soldiers to their deaths for years or agree to redraw the lines?

[Jon Favreau]

Is it fucking redistricting?

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, like. Like, Zelensky wants to be defending the borders of his country from invasion. Like, this is good for him. And none of them poke Trump or press him on this claim that he's ended a bunch of wars, six wars.

[John Lovett]

Now it keeps going up. Like.

[Tommy Vietor]

So Trump has completely abandoned the idea of demanding a ceasefire from Putin because he's weak. And he got rolled in that meeting, and now he's saying, like, who needs a ceasefire? What's even the point? Well, the point is that people in Ukraine are under constant bombardment, right? So they're getting killed. So you want a ceasefire to save them in the near term, and then longer term, the concern is that Putin is just going to drag out these talks and press his military advantage as much as he can and take more territory and just sort of play for time. But also, like, he didn't end any wars. Like, this is what he posted about the India and Pakistan ceasefire. Quote, I am pleased to announce that India and Pakistan have agreed to a full and immediate ceasefire, because that's all it was. They don't like each other now. The countries, they aren't allies now. They haven't abandoned their nuclear weapons and decided to, like, become buddies. All he's gotten is ceasefires. And yet he, like, no one, no one calls him out.

[Jon Favreau]

Get a ceasefire between Israel and Iran. Because we bombed Iran.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, they patch things up, right?

[Donald Trump]

They're.

[Tommy Vietor]

They're buddies now, but it's also just.

[John Lovett]

Like, it goes to the point, right? Which is everybody also knows that all Trump wants is to say that he did it. Right. And that just gives you so much leverage in dealing with this person whose motivations are so obvious and, on the.

[Jon Favreau]

Surface, horny for that peace prize.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yes, yes. The other very revealing moment along these lines was when some reporter asked about Zelensky not being able to hold or when he's gonna hold an election. And Zelensky's like, look, under my constitution, I can't hold an election when we're at war. Think about this practically, because, first of all, it'd be very hard to vote when you're under bombardment by drones and ballistic missiles. Hundreds of thousands of troops are at the front, and then again, 10 million people are displaced. So how the hell do you hold an election? Like, it's practically very hard. But Trump's like, hey, buddy, pretty sweet that you managed to avoid that reelect by getting invaded.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, well, he took it as it.

[Tommy Vietor]

Go ahead.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, well, I was gonna say that even before you get how he joked about it for himself, which we'll get to. No one's a Democratic leader, obviously. Putin's not, but neither is Zelensky. It's no different than. Than the way Trump has to accuse every one of his opponents as to having done what he has done. Because it's not that. Because Putin cannot prove he is a Democratic leader. Trump cannot prove he is not corrupt. But he can try to make everybody look corrupt. He can try to claim that Zelensky is not a Democratic leader. Just two autocrats going toe to toe in a war of attrition where both sides are to blame. Even Putin, in his speech to Trump, describes it as a tragedy. Right. He constantly calls it a tragedy. And it's like, well, okay, yeah, how did this happen? What do we do?

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah.

[Jon Favreau]

Well, Trump clearly seemed to admire. The one thing he really admires about Zelensky is the suspending the election, because he went on to talk about that. And he also got some inspiration from Putin, apparently, on mail in ballots. Let's listen.

[Donald Trump]

Vladimir Putin said something, one of the most interesting things. He said your election was rigged because you have mail in voting. He said, mail in voting every election. He said, no country has mail in voting. It's impossible to have mail in voting and have honest elections. And he said that to me. It was very interesting because we talked about 2020. He said, you won that election by so much. We're going to end mail in Voting, It's a fraud. If you have mail in voting, you're not going to have many Democrats get elected. That's bigger than anything having to do with redistricting, believe me. And the Republicans have to get smart. So you say during, during the war, you can't have elections. So let me just say three and a half years from now. So you mean if we happen to be in a war with somebody, no more elections.

[Tommy Vietor]

Oh.

[Donald Trump]

I wonder what the fa.

[John Lovett]

You like this idea?

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, he's getting ideas. Trump also posted on Truth Social that he'll, quote, lead a movement to get rid of mail in ballots and voting machines, which will begin with an executive order, which he then said was an executive order being drawn up right now by the best lawyers in the country. He also said that states are, quote, merely an agent for the federal government in counting and tabulating the votes and, quote, must do what the federal government, as represented by the President of the United States tells them. That is of course not what the Constitution says, not what the Supreme Court has said. Not at all true with regard to fraud or America being the only country with mail in voting. Plenty of countries have mail in voting.

[Tommy Vietor]

Dozens of.

[Jon Favreau]

But between, between that threat and Trump's joke about postponing elections during war, what's your level of concern on this one? Is this just Trump being stupid or is this one that we should keep an eye on?

[John Lovett]

So on this specific, specific threat, the Constitution is explicit. It's not just clear, it is explicit. It says that legislatures are part, are in charge of running federal elections. And actually what Trump is saying here is in conflict with another crackpot right wing legal theory, which is the independent legislature theory, which it says not only are legislatures responsible for the administration of federal elections, they can't be questioned by or their laws can't be adjudicated by the courts, maybe even the Supreme Court, Congress can.

[Jon Favreau]

Congress is the only Congress can.

[John Lovett]

But that court's ruling what those laws mean can't supersede what the legislature said. That was their way of trying to get around some votes in 2020 and they'll probably try it again.

[Jon Favreau]

But certainly the executive and has no role.

[John Lovett]

No, it's not, it's. It's right. Congress can set certain rules to govern to, to regulate elections, but the President is not mentioned anywhere and, and legislatures run their elections. But whatever the specifics of the, of the order he was told about and is then describing, he's very bad at telephone. It is like it's. Our level of concern should be very high to answer Your question? Because whatever he does here, he is going to try wherever he can, like a rap protesting the fences, to figure out the weaknesses that he can exploit before the midterms in 2026 and the general in 2028. And because everything with Trump is either these worries feel too early and then our responses feel too late. That is up to and including him finding some pretense to not leave office in 2028. He's doing a lot of redecorating for a guy who's only supposed to be there for a short term lease. And so all of this to me is sort of, these are red sirens, the scariest color for sirens going off.

[Jon Favreau]

They're not blue, they're not white.

[John Lovett]

And so, like this, he's going to, you know, this plus, you know, the tabulating of votes he's always attacking. It has to be done super quickly. He wants paper ballots, fine. But it's an agent of the federal government. So now we have federal agents coming in. What, to monitor elections. Like, you can see this playing out in a dozen of very bad ways. Whatever he can't get away with on mail in ballots.

[Tommy Vietor]

I mean, Putin doesn't like mail in ballots because it's just so much easier to physically stuff a ballot box or just bus people to multiple voting locations and have them vote a bunch of times or just like kill your opponent. You know what I mean? It's just an inefficient way to steal an election.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. Killing your opponents is much easier.

[Tommy Vietor]

You just gotta kill them off.

[John Lovett]

Yeah. Or just change the numbers after.

[Jon Favreau]

Right.

[John Lovett]

I mean, there's a lot of ways when you're Putin, there's a lot of ways to win it.

[Tommy Vietor]

You just get 100% in the regions where you want to get 100% and then you're fine. Yeah, I have the same reaction you did. Like, I'm like, Trump rails against mail in ballots until it's time for him to vote himself, Then he does it. His campaign is opposed to mail in ballots until they see a political advantage and then they whip votes that way or try to get people to vote that way. But I more broadly worried, like you are, about Trump trying every way possible to take control over the voting process or just find ways to make it harder for Democrats to vote, especially in cities. Like, that's the end game.

[John Lovett]

I think.

[Jon Favreau]

Yes. I think there's intimidation that we should worry about around election time. I think that post election is still probably the more dangerous period because of.

[Tommy Vietor]

What makes you think that.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, right. I don't know, a couple years ago. And look, I think he can, you know, try to convince Republican governors and Republican legislatures to get rid of mail in voting in red states, but like that. Okay, first of all, I don't think they're gonna do that. Cause the Republican Party has realized that was the stupidest thing he tried to do in 2020, and that that's why in 2024 they all decided to push mail in voting. So, I don't know, Republicans will wanna do that, but even if they did, you need the electoral votes of the blue states. And then, you know, he could try to get Republicans in Congress to introduce something, but that would run up against, you know, it would need 60 votes. So then maybe. Yeah, then you'd have to have a scenario where they get rid of the filibuster to pass some, you know, elimination of mail in voting in the tabulation machines, which he's mad, but he wants watermarked paper ballots now, which is fucking ridiculous. Sure. They're not going to give any states money for that kind of transition either. So. Yeah, I mean, it's not likely, but there are plenty of other things that can go wrong.

[John Lovett]

Well, look, the, like, stepping back. One of our great protections from when Russia tried to figure out if it could get into sort of the voter rolls. One of our great protections From Trump in 2020, when he was trying to overturn the election, is the fact that our electoral system is incredibly complex. And it is disaggregated, it is run. Forget the state level, it's run at the county level, it's run locally. And that makes stealing an election federally very, very difficult. That is very, very difficult.

[Jon Favreau]

Good.

[John Lovett]

That is a really good thing. And this is like fascism. You look back on the terms they had for it. I can't remember off the top of my head, there's a German word for it about a government that can flip like a switch. That's what that. That was a term for it. And it was an exciting technological advance like electricity, that you could just have a government where at the very top, a person can flip the switch and change everything beneath it. That is very appealing to Trump. Forget the comparison. That idea of a government that runs that way is very appealing to him, is very dangerous for a democracy. And any way he can undermine that independence, that disaggregation, is dangerous. And that is what he will try to do. And he will probably, for the most part, fail, but only probably and only mostly. And that's what makes it so dangerous.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. He continues to try to Go for the maximalist positions and then he sees what he can get. Sometimes he gets it, sometimes he doesn't. Pod Save America is brought to you by Wild Alaskan Company. Wild Alaskan Company is the best way to get wild caught. Perfectly portioned, nutrient dense seafood delivered directly to your door. Trust me, you haven't tasted fish this good. Love it. You recently cooked up some Wild Alaskan fish?

[John Lovett]

I did. I got a box and it's easy. It arrives, you put it in the fridge overnight and the next day you have really great. I had really great salmon. I have other great fish, the name of which eludes me. But as a white fish was very good. It's fun to have like kind of fish ready to go in the fridge. And then I made like a miso salmon. That was very good. I mean like a coconut curry with the whitefish. It was very good.

[Jon Favreau]

Wow.

[John Lovett]

Cooking up a storm now.

[Jon Favreau]

Sounds delicious. Wild Alaskan is 100% wild caught, never farmed. This means there are no antibiotics, GMOs or additives. Just clean, real fish that support healthy oceans and fishing communities. Wild Alaskan fish is frozen off the boat to lock in taste, texture and nutrients. Like Omega threes. Wild Caught from Alaska. Every order supports sustainable harvesting practices and your membership delivers flexible shipments, expert tips and truly feel good seafood. Try it risk free with their 100% money back guarantee. If you're not completely satisfied with your first box, Wild Alaskan Company will give you a full refund. No questions asked, no risk, just high quality seafood. Not all fish are the same. Get seafood you can trust. Go to wildalaskin.com crooked for $35 off your first box of premium wild caught seafood. That's wildalaskan.com crooked for $35 off YOUR first order. Thanks to Wild Alaskan Company for sponsoring this episode. Let's turn to what our government is doing to help support fascism here at home. The military occupation of our nation's capital could double in size thanks to Republican governors in West Virginia, Ohio, South Carolina and late breaking now Louisiana deciding to deploy another 750 troops to join the 800 National Guard members currently patrolling the streets of D.C. and they may start carrying weapons because it's always good to have more guns on the streets. The Wall Street Journal reports that people living in the D.C. neighborhoods with the most crime are wondering why they're not seeing Trump's deployment fighting any crime on their streets. The streets that have the crime. The Journal says, quote, the most visible show of force has centered on the city's upscale Corridors and tourist hubs and focused on arresting immigrants, the homeless, quote, seatbelt violations and putting drunk revelers in Ubers. Unnamed FBI agents.

[John Lovett]

That seems okay. Yeah, yeah.

[Tommy Vietor]

It's just nice to play.

[Jon Favreau]

Don't know if we need the National Guard for that.

[John Lovett]

That's right.

[Jon Favreau]

Unnamed FBI agents told the Journal they are, quote, worried they're neglecting larger national security threats or their own cases. Yeah. Though, per usual, the stars of the show seem to be armed, masked, unidentified ICE agents who were filmed over the weekend tackling and tasing a delivery driver, complaining about liberals ruining the country and ripping down anti ICE signs. A video which ICE proudly tweeted out, here's some sound from those incidents.

[John Lovett]

Yo, let's see.

[Jon Favreau]

Let's see some badge. Yo, let's see some badge work, boys. Let's see some badge work.

[John Lovett]

Do I have to answer to you? You gotta answer to somebody.

[Jon Favreau]

So wait, so you guys are just masked?

[John Lovett]

We just masked up. Oh, you guys are ruining this country.

[Bridget Brink]

You know that, right?

[Donald Trump]

Liberals already ruined it.

[John Lovett]

Oh, there we go.

[Jon Favreau]

Okay.

[John Lovett]

Mine.

[Donald Trump]

We're taking America back, baby.

[Jon Favreau]

Now, an NPR reporter did say that the residents of Mount Pleasant, where the sign was taken down, all saw that the sign was replaced afterwards with a dildo. I don't know if you guys saw that.

[Tommy Vietor]

There's been a lot of dildo, actually.

[Jon Favreau]

A lot of dildo, actually.

[Tommy Vietor]

A lot of dildos being thrown on the courts at WNBA games. It's not like an old head thing, but there was a dildo thrown onto the end zone at a Bills game, I believe, a few years back.

[Jon Favreau]

Dildos are flying.

[John Lovett]

Tommy, I just want you to know that I think there's been a lot of dildo action in this country for some time. If you're just coming around to. To dildos, you should know that they've been in the mix for a lot.

[Jon Favreau]

There was a third dildo incident recently.

[John Lovett]

That was another person who believes. Damn it.

[Tommy Vietor]

Who believes in the third dildo theory.

[Jon Favreau]

Wasn't the WNBA games. It was something else. Anyway, a lot of dildos. Are you guys impressed with all the crime fighting that's been happening in D.C. yeah.

[Tommy Vietor]

I mean, I think a lot of D.C. residents would say that there is a crime problem in D.C. but the issue is not the Lincoln Memorial getting carjacked. And I think you made the point that they're kind of giving up the game by sending troops to monuments. You got Pete Hegseth tweeting about how Union Station has got some big deployment. It's like, are we protecting the sparrow? Like what's happening?

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, they're running down the people. Taking the breadbasket from the Diplomat.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, I mean, I will say that the men's room at Union Station is a crime. If somebody could do something about that fucking place. That place has been disgusting since we were there. It remains so.

[Tommy Vietor]

But obviously I view this through the lens of. You do too. The LA people who. We had our own fake troop deployment to solve a non existent problem with non existent protesters. But, like, when I kind of squinted this, I see it one of two ways. The first is Trump is just doing whatever he can to highlight law and order as an issue and pick a fight with Democrats. And the unique way that DC is governed allows him this ability to send in federal agents and just, you know, create a narrative. And like, to be clear, he wants these fights. Like the sandwich guy throwing the sandwich.

[Jon Favreau]

At the ice agent, which is very, very funny.

[Tommy Vietor]

That's a funny video.

[John Lovett]

Expensive sandwich.

[Tommy Vietor]

Like, I lost his job. Yeah, I feel bad for that guy. I don't think it wasn't. Look, the funniest part of that is he outruns all those agents running, like, at a.

[John Lovett]

At a. Barry's beginner speed.

[Tommy Vietor]

I mean, just.

[John Lovett]

It's not fast.

[Tommy Vietor]

That's.

[John Lovett]

That's a 5. Oh, that's a 5o jog.

[Jon Favreau]

Did you see DHS brought cameras and filmed going into his apartment. They're 28 and arresting him. 20 agents?

[Tommy Vietor]

Yes.

[Jon Favreau]

This is like, like, well, that's all their dream. A deep state DOJ person sandwich who threw a sandwich and was running away. Like, that's. They. That's owning the libs. That's what they're here for.

[Tommy Vietor]

Stonewall. But. So that's like the good version of this. I think the bad version is like precedent for, you know, a takeover of DC, if the time was right. Like January6.2.0. Or to deploy troops across the country in some sort of quasi martial law. And that's where all these governors kind of just being so thirsty to get in the game and send troops to Washington is really pretty weird. And so, I don't know, like, the pretext here was. I think. I mean, I was off last week, but it was big boss balls.

[Jon Favreau]

This is all big balls.

[Tommy Vietor]

God beat. No, look, to be clear, I don't want to See anyone manhandling Mr. Balls in Dupont Circle. That is not cool and not something I'm for, but I feel confident the D.C. police Department could have handled that on their own.

[Jon Favreau]

This is big balls and dildos. This is what's. This is what we're having happening in D.C. what do you guys make of the response from a lot of elected Democrats over the weekend that Trump's deployment is a stunt and a distraction?

[John Lovett]

So those are two different things. It is absolutely a stunt. We know it's a stunt. He saw it on Fox News. He saw it. I'm going to do something about this. They cobbled together this plan. They bring Pam Bondi out. I always say, Pam Bandy. Pam Bondi out to the teleprompt, to the press conference to be like, crime is ending and it's ending now. Of course it's a stunt. Like, but that's how he, that's how Trump governs. He governs with stunts. Announcing tariffs on the whole world is a stunt. He's very good at getting a lot of attention on the stories that he wants attention on it. But that doesn't make it a distraction. Right. It doesn't mean that's something that you should ignore. Like, it's a big deal that he's doing it. You have to meet him where the attention is. He's gotten the attention. You have to respond to it. You have to have an argument about it. So that's first. Then you have to hold him accountable for the consequences of the stunt, whether it's the failure to deliver, because, no, this will not solve crime in this country. National Guard doing traffic stops outside of Sweet Green at the corner of 14th and R is not going to stop crime in D.C. and then there's just like the, the, the sort of, the other consequences of this. Trump today, in the meeting with Zelensky, made some point about how. Or it was in an answer to a question about how MTG and her boyfriend were able to go walk in the streets. So Trump made it safe again. And Trump then jumped out. Oh, I'm hearing from all kinds of friends saying that they haven't gone out to dinner in D.C. in years, and now they're going out and all the restaurants are full. I was like, that's a strange thing for Donald Trump to say. So I look, I was like, why is he saying that? Well, he's saying that because OpenTable reported that the restaurant reservations plummeted after this takeover because, as we all know, criminals and homeless people use OpenTable to book their reservations, but it's still hurting their businesses. And then the third part of it is we have to figure out ways to elevate the stories that are dramatic and interesting enough to compete with the stunts. Right. That means pulling the moments where ice is manhandling People for no reason. It means telling the stories of immigrants or American citizens grabbed off the street for no reason. We have to compete with Trump and his stunts with a level of drama and human interest that gets people attention. And the good news is that I do think on social media especially, what spreads are these stories that make what Trump is doing feel real for people in the way we would hope that it does. So, like, yes, it's a stunt. No, it's not a distraction.

[Jon Favreau]

I was wondering where all the distraction stuff came from, because it's really, really been kicked up lately on a whole bunch of issues. And then I saw some polling last week from Blue Rose Research. They did, like a bunch of message testing. And they said of the 16 Democratic messages tested about the Trump DC takeover, just two tested above average. The first one is called pivot to tariffs. Trump's takeover of DC's police is a stunt to distract from the pain his tariffs are causing families. Trump's tariffs are driving up prices on groceries, cars, and everyday goods. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then the next one, of course, pivot to Medicaid. While Donald Trump is sending troops into D.C. in the name of safety, he just cut Medicaid for millions of Americans. And then it goes on about the Medicaid cuts. Okay, so I could see why when you read someone two statements that are mostly about tariffs and Medicaid cuts, they're like, oh, yeah, that's pretty fucked up in real life. If someone was like, what's the deal with Trump's takeover of dc, and you said it's a distraction from the tariffs, you sound like a fucking moron. And the person would think you sound like a fucking moron.

[Tommy Vietor]

It's kind of like the Swiss army knife of pivots. You know what I mean? That's all anyone's saying. Trump is talking about this because he doesn't want you to talk about that. And you can just insert anything you want. And I think there was, look, there was a. The two weeks of Epstein, there was certainly a series of attempts to distract from that narrative, Right? Like when you're hitting the no sugar coated Obama treason button over and over again. Right?

[Jon Favreau]

That was a clear example of distraction.

[Tommy Vietor]

But I think, like, I'm going to deploy the National Guard to D.C. to drive a message about law and order. Is Trump, like, getting back to his core message and thing he wants to talk about?

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. Which is an authoritarian takeover of the country. And, like, it's pretty clear, right? The Epstein thing is very funny because if you guys remember at the beginning of the Epstein scandal, as many of us were talking about it, some elected Democrats were like, Epstein, this Epstein thing is just a distraction from the Medicaid cuts. Now they're all in, all in on Epstein. And now the authoritarian takeover is a distraction from the Epstein files. And look, I think fucking say what you think. Same you think about what's going on.

[John Lovett]

The insurrection was a distraction from Medicare cuts as well, but still important and worth talking about. Yeah, I just. The other thing about it too is like, forget sounding stupid to people, this is a distraction. Like, who are you telling that to? Like, who is your, who is hearing that from you? Is it someone watching msnbc? Is it someone already following you on social media? Like when you say into some lens that it is a distraction, who's on the other side? Because it's not the person you're trying to reach with the most, with the, you're not getting the person who is the, the, the sort of, the person you're hoping will receive the best poll tested message. You're, you're reaching someone who's already very engaged on the topic, most likely. And you're trying to figure out how to, how to combat what Donald Trump is doing by arming that audience and people beyond it with some sort of a story about why what he's doing is wrong. Because otherwise what's out there is just Trump doing this and a bunch of Democrats saying, well, really, we should be talking about something else. And no one answers the actual thing of why it is wrong for Donald Trump to deploy troops in D.C. due to a kind of a manufactured crime wave.

[Jon Favreau]

I mean, it's always overlearning the lesson of the last election and in 2024, it was like, shouldn't talk about democracy, should talk about kitchen table issues, which voters cared about more. And what these Democrats are saying by talking about distraction is the Medicaid cuts and the tariffs are more unpopular than Trump attempting to fight crime is unpopular. That's what they're trying to say. But instead use this distraction language which just doesn't make sense.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, I think it's a little different. I think it's more like Democrats not wanting to talk about immigration in the last election and pivoting to anything else. It's like, no, this is a thing people care about. It's happening in the world. Talk about it, take it on, make an argument like, first of all, put forward your case for how you'd make things better, but also make the point that, like, if you're worried about crime, just Deploying National Guard guys with no law enforcement training to hang out at the Lincoln Memorial is not going to do anything.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. And again, my view on the various federal agents and troops that are all over D.C. now is like, national Guard troops are like, why the fuck are we here? That's what they were like in la. And, you know, that's why they. You know who they are by their uniform and they don't wear masks and they're probably like, what are.

[Tommy Vietor]

You know, they don't want to be there either.

[Jon Favreau]

They don't want to be there either. The FBI agents that are running around are like, yeah, we have actual threats to go take care of. We don't know why we're here. But again, they're clearly identified as FBI. You know that this is all about fucking letting the secret police force, ice, just go wild and do whatever they want. Those are the people tackling people tasing, people saying, liberals ruin the country. Just like fucking. I was going to say mask off, but not. But just saying the quiet part out loud here, right? That, like, they just don't like liberals. They're. They're politicized, that you can't identify them. The guy that. The people that tased the Delivery driver on 14th street, no one knew where they were coming from. It just said police on them, but, like, no identification whatsoever. I mean, that. That's what this is. And that's fucking dangerous.

[John Lovett]

Yeah. And.

[Jon Favreau]

And ICE is dangerous.

[John Lovett]

And there is, I'm sure, the problem, right, too, is that, like, for any Paul, any individual politician talking about this, right, like they would rather be talking about healthcare issues that they, first of all, maybe have more knowledge or care about. That's why they're in politics. Right. And there is just less equity in talking about these issues where Trump has more purchase with the electorate on crime, on immigration, though, he's lost a lot of ground there. And you may not fight to a win, you may not even fight to a draw on the issue, but we have to be making an argument collectively against what Trump is doing. You may not win there. You may wish we were having a debate about health care and Medicaid cuts and all the rest. I wish we were, too, but we're not. And when we cede those grounds completely, we lose, sort of. We lose ground to Trump that we don't get back when we eventually do talk about the big beautiful bill or whatever.

[Jon Favreau]

The guy's underwater on immigration, which was his best issue. And the reason he is is because he, you know, took it to the extreme and Then a bunch of Democrats finally made the argument instead of avoiding talking about immigration, and now he's underwater on the issue. Pod Save America is brought to you by policygenius. Here's a stat that stops people in their tracks. Nearly half of American adults say they would suffer financial hardship within six months if they lost their primary income earner. If that stat hits close to home, you're not alone and you're not out of options. Policygenius makes finding and buying life insurance simple, ensuring that your loved ones have a financial safety net they can use in case something happens to you, whether to cover debts or routine expenses, or even to invest the money and earn interest over time. You can compare quotes from top insurers and find coverage that fits your needs and your budget. With Policygenius, you can find life insurance policies starting at just $276 a year for $1 million in coverage. It's an easy way to protect the people you love and feel good about the future. Look it policygenius is great because it sort of simplifies the whole process of shopping for life insurance, which is a process that, you know, no one really likes to think about, no one likes to do. But with Policy Genius, it's super easy. They got licensed agents who will just walk you through the whole process and they can answer all the questions, they can handle the paperwork and it's a really useful, easy to use service. Secure your family's future with Policygenius. Head to policygenius.com crooked to compare free life insurance quotes from top companies and see how much you could save. That's policygenius.com CROOKED all right, let's talk about the latest in the redistricting wars. On Monday, Texas Democrats ended their two week walkout and returned to the state, clearing the way for Governor Abbott and Texas Republicans to pick up five Republican congressional seats at the request of President Trump. Democrats said their conditions to return were met after California Democrats, led by Governor Newsom, last week announced a redistricting plan that would offset any gains made in Texas. The California plan, which Newsom discussed with Dan in our last episode, would net Democrats five new House seats, but would only go into effect if other states redraw their maps first and only last for the 26, 28 and 30 election cycles before reverting to the nonpartisan Redistricting commission. And the plan would have to be approved by California voters this November. Let's start with Texas. Tommy, I think the first time we talked about this, you called that there was no way the Democrats would be able to stay out of Texas until December. What do you make of them returning for this second session, mission accomplished?

[Tommy Vietor]

I mean, I think their best and only card to play was to raise awareness about what was happening. And so to the extent that, I mean, they did a good job, I think they got this on everyone's radar screen. They did a lot of media. This was just kind of like the Texas legislature. It's a part time gig. Most of them have jobs, they have families. They had things they had to do in Texas. So, like, just being on the lam forever was not an option. I'm like, very glad that Gavin Newsom has taken this on and has made this a cause. I think it's going to benefit him enormously politically and I think it's really meaningful. I think his hope was probably that there could be some sort of mutually assured destruction approach where it's like he told Texas, don't redistrict or else we will too. So it just sort of stopped everyone. It seems like that's not gonna be the case here because Texas Republicans are shameless. But yeah, it sucks.

[Jon Favreau]

It sucks. What do you think?

[John Lovett]

Yeah, look, they're putting their best face on going back having not been able to stop the gerrymander from happening. But would California be doing this had Texas not fled? I don't know.

[Jon Favreau]

I think so. I think Newsom was talking about it before they ever left.

[John Lovett]

Well, regardless, I think it, it sort of ignited something, ignited a conversation. I don't. Maybe it still would have had to get through the legislature, so it had to go before voters. I do think it like brought to the fore gerrymandering, whether it would have happened regardless, I don't know whether Texas Democrats could have held out longer. Who knows? Seems like no, because they, they're going back now means they thought, well, maybe we can hang out a little while longer, but not all the way to December, so we might as well give up now. When I talk to James Talarico and I asked like, well, what's the. Is the plan to hold out? They were saying they weren't going to think past the session. And I was like, well, what's the hope? And the hope is that Texas Democrats back down from pressure from other states. Neither of those felt likely at the time. But if we end up in a situation where now Democrats are doing redistricting in California at least to like partially stem the losses, I think that's a good outcome.

[Jon Favreau]

How do you guys feel about the prospect of Newsom's election rigging response act getting approved by voters this November. I mean, I'm gonna vote for it. We're gonna have to fight.

[Tommy Vietor]

I mean, like, hopefully this is, you know, it's an off year vote. Hopefully it'll be base turnout. A lot of Democrats who sort of understand what's happening here. I mean, it's really important that people understand that he is responding to a massive overreach by Trump to redistrict in, like, in the middle of the decade in something that's completely unprecedented, and that he's doing so only as a response to Texas. And it's not a permanent thing.

[John Lovett]

He.

[Tommy Vietor]

This is just a temporary fix to respond to what Texas is doing. I think that that's. It's going to be challenging. I mean, it's tough that Schwarzeneggers out there are fighting this hard, but I think we have no other choice. I think Democrats generally have no other choice to fight against gerrymandering like this long term, it really sucks. I think it really muddles any kind of semblance of a reform message from Democrats or in longer term. Like, more gerrymandered districts make politics more polarized and more extreme. And they help people like Donald Trump, because when Trump has a bunch of Republicans in totally gerrymandered districts, he can fully control whoever represents that district because all they care about is a primary election and not a general election. But, you know, we're gonna have to fight for this. I mean, I think. I don't know. I've seen just that one political story in the one set of polling that wasn't exactly what Gavittez put forward. Like, basically they pulled the approval in the state of getting rid of the independent Commission, which is not at all what Gavin Newsom has proposed.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, look, I think there's going to be a glut of ads that are going to be extremely deceptive of what this is that's going to claim. Do you want to vote for partisan politics or for independence in a way that I think appeals to maybe lower engaged voters or people that are going to kind of clock in right towards the end? That's worrying. I hope that because it is a midterm and because I think people are going to be pretty fired up about this and explain why this is necessary. I hope it will win the day. It does say something about our politics that Arnold Schwarzenegger, who very powerfully spoke out about why Trump is such a danger, is sort of pumping iron and getting ready to fight here, but not in Texas or not anywhere else. I mean, this is his State and it is his baby, but still just says something about. Also just about how redistricting has worked. Right. Colorado has independent redistricting. We have independent redistricting. It's been pursued by some of the biggest names in Democratic politics. And now we've sort of caught on our asses because Republicans are willing to do this mid decade. And it talks about some of the ways in which our politics are asymmetrical. But yeah, I'm glad we're doing it. I hope we get it through. Yeah.

[Jon Favreau]

I think polarization sort of rules everything around us these days. And I think you have a big Democratic voter registration in California, and I think if you ask California Democrats, would you rather Republicans have a lock on the House of Representatives in the midterms so they can continue to rubber stamp Donald Trump's agenda, or do you care more about keeping independent redistricting and getting rid of gerrymandering? They're gonna say they care more about the midterms if it's communicated well. I mean, it's still gonna take some work, it's gonna take a lot of money, and it's by no means a sure thing. But I just, I feel like in this case polarization's gonna help us because it is a. It's pretty clear that if California doesn't do it, they're gonna start with a 5 to 10 seat head start on the midterms.

[John Lovett]

Yeah. And in terms of the long term effect of what gerrymandering does, like, I hear you, Tommy, on like the ways it makes kind of, it draws people to the extremes in those districts. But you look at where we're at now with where the Republic, with the vote on this big beautiful bill, right. There was like one or two super right wing holdouts. There are no Republican moderates left. There are a few Democratic moderates. But no matter how you draw the maps, there will still be swing districts all across the country. Already we're pretty polarized in Congress. So, like, I'm less worried about the effects on how we govern and more just the brute partisan impact of gerrymandering and the fact that if we do this, and this will be what we'll get to next. What is the Republican reaction? Because they have more arrows in their quiver than we do.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. Also we spent a couple years trying to pass a bill just a couple years ago that would have outlawed gerrymandering all across the country. So I think Democrats can very easily say now we've gerrymandered, you've gerrymandered, we'll give up our gerrymandering if you give up your gerrymandering. And if they don't want to, then, like, you know, I don't think they. I think the reform message is still strong.

[Tommy Vietor]

Then we can say that. But that just. It sounds kind of childish, you know, like, you're right. Of course we're all supported that bill. I just think it muddles it and it sucks.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah.

[Tommy Vietor]

Like, there are a lot of Democratic states that are gerrymandered to fuck already. It's not like Democrats are out there leading the charge, complaining about Maryland. You know, it's like, no, but if.

[Jon Favreau]

We had passed the John Lewis voting rights bill, then Maryland, none of them would.

[Tommy Vietor]

We would support universal redistricting reform for the country. But, like, there's a lot of hypocrisy here that I think is challenging.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, I mean, look, I think every single Democrat in the country voted for that bill, voted to get rid of gerrymandering, including the senators from Maryland and from every other Democratic.

[Tommy Vietor]

I know, it's just a tough sell. I think it's a tough sell.

[Jon Favreau]

New York Times published a great analysis over the weekend that quantified the party's Republican Party's redistricting advantage that just as Republicans have the potential to pick up seats in 15 different states, while Democrats only have the potential to pick up seats in three to four if you include California after passage of its ballot measure. So we basically knew this. But after the California news, it does seem like a good reminder that Republicans can still rig the maps to start the midterms with a big advantage of the House.

[John Lovett]

Yeah. Also, just part of the reason why Republicans are against independent redistricting is because it helps Democrats more than it helps Republicans because the maps are inherently less fair to Democrats because of where Democrats live and how we're distributed, our protection here, we talked about this a little bit, but some of this is kind of old school politics. And there are natural breaks on gerrymandering. One being that if you gerrymander too hard, you can lose your seats in a wave. The other being what you do when you gerrymander is you take seats from a safe Republican district and you put it in another district to make it more safe. But those are you're taking Republicans. Parts of you're taking Republican neighborhoods from Republican politicians in a lot of states. And they're gonna be fighting behind the scenes, never in public. Be like, hey, hey, that town of rich golfing assholes, they belong to me.

[Tommy Vietor]

Those are my people.

[John Lovett]

Those are my people. You're not giving them to this other freak. Those are my people.

[Jon Favreau]

It is wild that the California Republicans and the New York Republicans and everywhere else, they're probably going to lose their seats or just sort of, you know, maybe they put out a statement given up slightly, but it's like, you know, it's Donald Trump's party and he's the king and you don't piss him off and so. Or whatever, I guess I'll just lose my job.

[Tommy Vietor]

It's pathetic. It's truly pathetic.

[Jon Favreau]

And just don't say anything. Yeah, pretty fucking wild. Pretty wild. All right, before we jump to the interview, we should talk now that we're on Newsom, about his social media strategy. If you're no longer on Twitter, you may have missed the rollout of Newsom's new press office account where the governor's team has been posting aggressive parodies of Trump's all caps, tweets, and over the top memes like this one. Let's check it out. For those who are just listening, love, can you describe what we're seeing here?

[John Lovett]

Yes, it's Gavin Newsom being supported by the angel of Hulk Hogan. And a living Kid Rock. And a living Tucker Carlson, I believe, with his hands on his shoulders.

[Tommy Vietor]

They're all laying hands on him.

[John Lovett]

Which is interesting that only Hulk Hogan is dead because normally it's the kind of it's the spirits pile.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. Couple.

[John Lovett]

But it's a beautiful, moving AI portrait and I think speaks to the promise of AI itself and why we're all so excited about it.

[Bridget Brink]

Yeah.

[Jon Favreau]

I wonder if they could have used other MAGA stars who have passed, like, like Hulk Hogan, Herman Cain.

[Tommy Vietor]

Oh, that's a good idea.

[John Lovett]

I'm trying to think of the reason the Kaiser.

[Jon Favreau]

I don't know what the Kaiser.

[John Lovett]

I don't know where the Kaiser would have been out on maga.

[Jon Favreau]

What do you guys think about the social media thing? I think it's great.

[John Lovett]

I'll tell you something. I saw the first one, like the parody one, and it gave me a weird feeling. At first it was like, oh, yeah.

[Jon Favreau]

That'S right, you did say that.

[John Lovett]

And it hit me in a strange way. But I love two things about it. One, I love the commitment to the bit, and the bid has only gotten stronger with commitment. And they are excellent. They're not. They're not like, it's real humor. It's not resistance lib version of a Trump tweet. They really are doing a good job of getting the voice. Yeah. And so the fact that it's being done so well is working for me. And it's annoying them. The fact that it's getting a rise out of them is making me like it more.

[Tommy Vietor]

It's breaking through, it's getting attention. People are talking about it. Republicans are mad about it. Democrats find it funny, I admit. Like, I too, when I first saw the kind of all caps, Trump parody, sad exclamation. Like, I just. I was like, oh, boy, where's this going to go?

[John Lovett]

Because we've seen a lot of it done poorly.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah. Now this is done well. And it's. It's not just like Trump trolling. Like, you know, the Libs of TikTok account tweeted an attack on Gavin Newsom. So they replied with a photo of her holding up the Epstein Files phase one binder and said, great job, Chaya. Right. So they're just like, going after tons of people. And I think that pisses off the Republicans. It gets you attention. It also gets you some sort of, like, algorithmic juice, right? Because you're engaging in fights and people are looking at it and they're sharing it and they're commenting and it's just like, you know, this. The JD Vance one of him. What was the name of the. The Australian breakdancer. Oh, what's her name?

[John Lovett]

Fuck. Skeet Shoot. Nope.

[Jon Favreau]

What?

[John Lovett]

No, it was something.

[Tommy Vietor]

You know what I mean?

[John Lovett]

Skeet Skater. Eight. Gator Skater.

[Tommy Vietor]

Ray Gun.

[John Lovett]

Ray Gun.

[Jon Favreau]

Close. You're so close. Almost there.

[Tommy Vietor]

You know, it's funny. I like it. You know, tweeting the video of JD Vance jogging like an idiot. Like, I like it. It's fun.

[Jon Favreau]

It is wild to me. I mean, it's not surprising, but it's still wild that. So that one of the deputy press secretaries in the White House was like, this is so lame and unserious that he's doing this. And. And Dana Perino, just on the five, was like, where is Gavin Newsom's wife? And all this. How could she be letting him do this? It's so unserious. This is not how he thinks this is gonna be successful. And I was like. I tweeted. I was like, what do you think of Donald Trump's social media strategy? Do you think that's a thing? And she's like, well, I just. I think that. I don't think it's gonna work. I don't think it's gonna work.

[John Lovett]

Well, everyone went down to, oh, it's not gonna work. Oh, so it's a strategic impulse that you're feeding. And the. What I What I also appreciate about this and what I appreciate about what Gavin Newsom has been doing with redistricting, with the way that he's doing press, the way that he's sort of coming on our show is we talked about, like, how. Who's going to be the person that takes on maga. Maybe it's Gavin, maybe it's not. But the way we find out is by seeing how they take on, like, what the right person for who's going to take on whoever replaces Trump or is Trump in 2028. How do we figure out who the right person is? Well, let's see what they're doing right fucking now. How are they fighting back against MAGA now? How are they making. Making news and taking attention now? And so I view this as like a time where the people that are going to be the right people to lead this are going to be showing us what they want to do and how they're going to fight them. And the people that are hanging back to wait for their moment to ride in on a white horse, I'm just less interested in.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, it's like shamelessness and commitment really gets you a long way. Donald Trump has shown us that. And somewhere Gavin Newsom must have had a meeting where he was like, you know what? I trust you guys. Let rip. Have fun with this. And it's working. And you could just. Watching Republicans flail in response has been very funny. Like, I think it was over the weekend, some Republican account tweeted a photo of Gavin Newsom, like, 15 or 20 years ago, maybe, at a wedding.

[Jon Favreau]

Oh, yeah.

[Tommy Vietor]

Kind of looking. Looking like, you know, it was like 11 to 12 to 1am at a wedding next to a very attractive younger woman being like, you really gawking a little for that? He's gawking at her. Like, judging by the angle of the photo or whatever, I was like, do.

[Jon Favreau]

You think this makes him look bad?

[Tommy Vietor]

It's like a young, attractive photo of this man next to an attractive person.

[Jon Favreau]

Like, I thought you guys were. Yeah, I thought you were the manosphere party.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, I thought you guys got what voters. Like, this isn't a negative thing.

[John Lovett]

I thought you were. We used to be the ones for fucking in second. Now you are. That sucks. What? I'm just saying we got. Gen Z is not having sex. We got to. We got to. They're out there act. We got to be. Listen, America's going to vote for fucking in second. All right? Am I wrong? Are we sick? He's having fun.

[Jon Favreau]

That's why they put the dildo there.

[Tommy Vietor]

This is our lead into Bridget Brink.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, she's really excited about her decision.

[John Lovett]

Ukraine's getting fucked.

[Jon Favreau]

Okay, Okay. I will just say that also, like, Gavin Newsom has separated himself just a little bit from the. Like, it's not. His tweets are also punchy and great, but they're not the same parody voice as the account, which I think is it. It keeps his stature and it's. Is doing his. In his press office is doing it. And so, like, he. He's having fun. He likes it, he's enjoying it. But, like, when he's given interviews, he's not. He's not doing the voice, moron.

[John Lovett]

He's not doing the voice. You know, it's just like, hey, like, there was. There was a moment in 2024, it was called, I don't know if you remember it, Brett Summer. And there was like a brief. It was. There was like a refreshing moment where people were just having fun and the team on the social media accounts were having fun, and it was exciting and it was generating enthusiasm. And did it work? Yes.

[Jon Favreau]

Well, I do think there's.

[John Lovett]

But no, but I just think it's, like, great to have, like, we're like, there's some fun in it.

[Jon Favreau]

It was good. It was good enough.

[John Lovett]

I'm joking, of course. It was awesome that that was happening. But it was exciting.

[Tommy Vietor]

There is, like, we do. Let's just define what success is like. Cause I saw some, like, self serious chod tweet. Like, liberals think this is how you convince swing voters to like, no, this is not about swing voters. This is about the base and getting attention and breaking through the clutter and the crap on social media so people know about you and what you're talking about and you're just making noise. That's all.

[Jon Favreau]

This is also, like, so many people in my life who are not political junkies have recently been like, I don't even know that much about Newsom, but these are really funny. I've noticed these. Like, attention is the most important currency. Yeah. Yeah.

[John Lovett]

The way that I think about it, too, is like, we don't get attention anymore. You have to take it. You take attention, and this is taking attention. That's great.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, it's a just. I think it's a distraction from Gavin's other problems. Yeah, it's a distraction from the Epstein files, from the takeover of dc, from the Medicaid cuts.

[Tommy Vietor]

She's like, make some Epstein and all right.

[Jon Favreau]

In a moment, you'll hear Tommy's conversation with former United States Ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink.

[Tommy Vietor]

Thank God.

[Jon Favreau]

Apologies, apologies.

[John Lovett]

But before that apology is not from me.

[Jon Favreau]

But before we jump to that, the new season of Shadow Kingdom is almost here. Shadow Kingdom Coal Survivor is the unbelievable true story of the deadly power struggle for control of the United Mine Workers of America and the son who took on a dangerous union boss to avenge his family's murder. At the center is Tony Boyle, the union president so powerful and corrupt he'd stop at nothing to keep control. And when a rival candidate threatened that, that man and his family ended up dead. Host Nicolo Minoni investigates the rise and fall of a union built to protect workers and the moment it became their greatest threat. With never before heard tapes, exclusive reporting and interviews with those who lived it, including Chip Yablonski, the surviving son of Tony's murdered rival. This season tells the story of a movement that turned deadly. Listen to the trailer now on the Shadow Kingdom feed and tune into the premiere of Shadow Kingdom August 21st 5th. Wherever you get your podcasts, Friends of the Pod subscribers can listen to the full season of Shadow Kingdom starting August 25th. Join [e-mail] friends or subscribe through the Shadow Kingdom Apple feed. PodCame America is brought to you by ZipRecruiter. Talk about how it can be overwhelming to have too many options. There's too many options to choose from here. You're trying to figure out which TV show that's actually the hard one. Way too many options now.

[John Lovett]

Way too many.

[Jon Favreau]

Go forever. Go forever.

[John Lovett]

There's so many shows on Apple.

[Jon Favreau]

Oh my gosh, don't even get me started on Netflix. The same applies if you're a business owner who's hiring. It can be overwhelming to have too many candidates to sort through. But you're in luck. ZipRecruiter now gives you the power to proactively find and connect with the best ones quickly.

[Bridget Brink]

How?

[Jon Favreau]

Through their innovative resume database. And right now you can try it for [e-mail] Crooked ZipRecruiter's resume database uses advanced filtering to quickly hone in on the top candidates for your roles. See a candidate you're really interested in. You can unlock their contact info instantly. 320,000 new resumes are added monthly, which means you can reach more potential hires and fill roles faster. No wonder ZipRecruiter is the number one rated hiring site based on G2. We love it here at Crooked. We've used it for years. It is a pain in the ass hiring and especially sorting through resumes. ZipRecruiter helps you do it. It's great. Skip the candidate overload. Instead, streamline your hiring with ZipRecruiter. See why 4 out of 5 employers who post on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate within the first day. Just go to this exclusive web address, ziprecruiter.com crooked right now to try it for free.

[Tommy Vietor]

Joining me now is the former US Ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Barinki. She is now running to represent Michigan's 7th congressional district. Ambassador, thank you so much for joining the show.

[Bridget Brink]

Thanks so much for having me, Tommy.

[Tommy Vietor]

So we all saw this press conference today between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and President Trump. The good news is it was not nearly as bad as the one we all watched in February. The bad news is I feel like a lot of the big kind of ticket issues are not resolved. What were your takeaways from what we saw and what you've read since?

[Bridget Brink]

Well, first of all, I think it's very good that it was better than the meeting in February, that's for sure. I think there were some critical things that need needed to come out of it, and I think it's yet to be seen if they did. And I think first and foremost, it's security for Ukraine. The starting point to ending this war is focusing on how do Ukrainians have security and if that problem can be solved. The other pieces, whether it's territory, whether it's assistance, whether it's other things, those can all follow. But the starting point is security. And it does sound like that was a topic of conversation both in the bilateral meeting, but also critically in the meeting with European leaders.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah. So there has been a lot of focus on this question of what a security guarantee for Ukraine could look like if the war were to end. The contours of, you know, the kind of broader deal could be Ukraine gives up a lot of territory to Russia, Putin agrees to end the war and not evade again. I guess we kind of pretend to believe him because he's a liar and we should not believe him on the front. But that pledge is also backed up by a European and potentially US Ukrainian security guarantee, maybe some sort of force in Ukraine that says, you know, if Putin does this again, we'll protect you. President Trump didn't rule out the US Playing a role in like, whatever the security force might look like. But I'm a little skeptical that you might see US Troops on the ground in Ukraine. But what, what kind of security guarantee do you think could actually Deter Putin?

[Bridget Brink]

Well, I think first and foremost, any diplomatic negotiation needs with Russia, certainly with Vladimir Putin, needs to do two things. And this is where I think we need to start. Number one, has to make sure that we don't give away things in advance. And that's already happened. Whether that is a meeting, which for someone maybe not in diplomacy, doesn't sound like a big deal, but that is a very big deal, to have a meeting with the President of the United States or maybe even more fundamentally, NATO membership. That is a decision for the members of NATO and those members alone. Those things have already been. Well, the meeting has happened, and NATO membership has at least, or in earlier conversations, been taken off the table. That's one thing that I think is problematic in the way this is being approached. The second, though, is trust but verify. I mean, this is something that has to be done with a leader like Vladimir Putin who, as you said, he lies, he agrees to things and then violates those agreements over and over and over again. So we can't trust anything that he is going to agree to. Instead, what we need to do and what Europe needs to do is come together with Ukraine on an agreement of what would make Ukrainians feel secure, secure so people come home and they can contribute to their own economy. Secure so that the US And Europeans can work together with Ukraine to invest for the benefit of both the countries and those that would happen only with maybe one option is NATO membership. It's not clear that this is something NATO members are yet ready to do. I actually think this would be a smart option. But if not NATO, it could be something else. It could be a coalition of the willing that provides some kind of security guarantee, so that essentially, if Putin violates the agreement, there will be a consequence. And that consequence will be not just Ukraine responding, it will be Ukraine plus other democratic partners responding.

[Tommy Vietor]

Trump and Zelenskyy were joined today, as you mentioned, by a collection of European heads of state and officials, leaders from France, Germany, Italy, Finland, the U.K. eU, NATO. Obviously, these countries, these entities, have a huge interest in the outcome from today's talks. But what did you make of the strategy of having them all in Washington with Zelenskyy at the same time as sort of part of this bilateral meeting?

[Bridget Brink]

Well, I would have preferred that it happened before a meeting with Vladimir Putin, but I think it's a good idea. I think and believe that our allies and partners are part of what increases US Power and that we should first and foremost be close with countries that align with our values, and that's democracy. That's rule of law, that's protection of human rights. And all of those countries that came to Washington represent that. So I think it's a great thing. I think that it's good if we're working together. It also shares the burden with Europe that we should do. And Europe is stepping up in a way that I think is very positive, including buying US Weapons that will then be given to Ukraine. But I think working with partners and allies is vitally important, and it's a change, and I think it should continue.

[Tommy Vietor]

Last week, Putin and Trump met in Alaska for this, whatever you want to call it, historic mess. They failed to broker a ceasefire. Trump kind of tried to yada, yada, yada away the value and importance of a ceasefire today. But, you know, going into that meeting, he said basically that that was the line of success or failure. You also heard Putin continue to outline pretty maximalist views. He kind of codes it as dealing with the root causes of the conflict, which I'd love for you to explain to our listeners. But what was your takeaway from this summit, such as it was in Alaska, and what maybe was achieved or not?

[Bridget Brink]

Well, I mean, I thought it was a win for Putin. And this is exactly why I resigned my from position as U.S. ambassador, because I could see this also back in April when I left my position and also left the State Department, that the instinct of President Trump and the administration is to appease Putin and to take what Putin says at face value and respond on his terms, not on our terms. And I believe we should be using the levers of American power to achieve a result, not just that's good for Ukraine, because it matters for Ukraine, obviously, but it also really deeply matters for Europe, and it matters for the United States. And that that result needs to be one that, again, starts with security, puts more sanctions on Russia. The economy is already hurting. There's more that can be done, and we should be doing it. And third, that gets the Russian sovereign assets that are in Europe. It's about $300 billion. Those could be used to buy weapons in America and potentially in Europe and in Ukraine, so that Ukraine can defend itself. There are many ways we can do this without an endless amount of American taxpayer money flowing to Ukraine, but that secure our interests.

[Tommy Vietor]

Do you really think that any kind of, like, security guarantee that doesn't include the backing of NATO or the United States can deter Putin? I mean, imagine, you know, we're talking about giving up. The Russians are demanding that the Ukrainians give up parts of the Donetsk province that are the Most heavily fortified. Obviously, the US is sort of the, the biggest military force within NATO. If we are not part of a security guarantee, that is Article 5, like that says, you know, an attack on Ukraine will be responded to militarily by the US Will that deter Putin?

[Bridget Brink]

Well, my belief is that NATO has already deterred Putin. So I believe that that optimally would be an option. We should go down conditions based for Ukraine. But to make clear that Putin has no business and no right and no ability to stop NATO from deciding as NATO which countries will be a part of this alliance. It's a defensive alliance, it's an offensive alliance. And we should not accept any of Putin's historical justifications for why he started this war in Ukraine in a sovereign country. So, yes, ideally it would be something as ironclad as NATO, but it could be something lesser than that. If that's not an immediate possibility, which I actually don't think it is immediately, then the question would be what would. And I think that's a question that the Ukrainians can answer. And I'm confident that between us and the Europeans, and I believe we would need to be a part of it, we could, we could answer that question. But again, because the promise that President Trump made to end this war is, is not happening. This is exactly the problem. We're six months into this administration and the claim that, you know, the war as, as I hear many times, would never have started under President Trump. I mean, the fact of the matter is the war has escalated since President Trump has taken office just in July. More civilians have been killed in, in that month than any month since May of 2022. That's when I first arrived in Kyiv. Additionally, more missiles and drones have been sent to Ukraine from Putin and Russia in July than any time since the beginning of the war. Over 6,000. I mean, imagine that. Imagine if that was America. I, I know this because I lived under these night after night. I know exactly what it's like for the people of Ukraine and we should not be okay with this. And we should be very clear to Putin and not welcoming him back with red carpet in Alaska so that we can hear out his rationale for starting the biggest land war in Europe since World War II. In my mind, this is crazy and this is not what we want to be representing. This is not using American power in a way that advances our values, advances our interests.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, I mean, two part question. I mean, can you sort of tell us what you've heard from folks you still talk to back in Ukraine about how they felt about seeing Trump literally roll out the red carpet for Putin. And then second, I mean, you were, I believe, in the State department for nearly 30 years. We actually overlapped at one point during the Obama administration when you were a detail to the nsc. I mean, back in, in my day, staffers like you, I was a little lower level than you, but like worked really, really hard to get all the details done in advance of the meeting so that the leaders could agree to it and have a big thing to announce. It seemed like this was just thrown together and the whole point of the Trump Putin meeting was just kind of the optics of the Putin meeting. I just sort of wondered what you made of that kind of slapdash method.

[Bridget Brink]

Yeah, well, you're exactly right. So it's great to see you again. But the meetings like this, summit meetings are ordinarily prepared weeks, if not months in advance. And so the outcomes of the meeting, and they're always outcome, focus. So we only agree to such a meeting after many meetings before happen and after we know what will come out of that meeting. And as you know, during the time when we were both in the White House under President Obama, these were just incredibly detailed and stage managed in a way so that the outcome met our needs and our interests. And in this case, I actually think it's more about a distraction. It's a distraction from. Well, most importantly, I think what's going on at home and promises not kept with regard to the economy, so promises to lower prices and make life more affordable are not. It's not happening. And I can tell you that from Michigan, where I am now, because I talk to people all over my district and they are very frustrated because prices are going up, their insurance costs are going up, their kids can't afford to buy their own houses. This is happening today in America. And we see this with the, the indicators that came out in just the last couple of weeks, the jobs report, the inflation report. I think this is more about distracting attention to something and as you can see, everyone's paying close attention to, in a slapdash way, so that the main issue that people are unhappy about is no longer the focus in the media. And I think we have to be really clear about this and show when promises that have been made by President Trump are not being kept. And I can tell you from Michigan that this is happening right here and.

[Tommy Vietor]

Right now, including the promise to end this war in 24 hours.

[Bridget Brink]

Exactly.

[Tommy Vietor]

Zelensky's last Oval Office meeting was an unmitigated disaster. And on some level like this was better than that. So I think there was a sigh of relief. But then we saw, you know, Trump and J.D. vance dressing down Zelensky. There were random reporters insulting Zelensky based on the clothing he was wearing. What was the reaction like in Ukraine after that meeting, and what do you think Zelenskyy learned from it, and how did he adjust going forward?

[Bridget Brink]

I think the reaction in Ukraine about the whole positioning of the United States after that meeting, but also during a number of key moments in, in the last few months, has been one of just shock and incomprehension. People don't understand what happened. I mean, I had a meeting with the foreign minister, one of my last meetings, and there's just not an understanding there. All he could say is, you know, what, what happened, you know, you were our closest ally. And I think the challenge we have in this instance is that we have turned our positioning 180 degrees, which, you know, any new administration gets to make the policy, and of course, that is goes to the president. But in this case, it doesn't meet our interest. It does not meet U.S. interests. And as you said, it also isn't achieving the promise that was made. End the war in 24 hours or end the war in 100 days. I mean, in either case, we're well past that point. And as I said, it's gotten worse. So what I think people feel is just. They don't understand. And it's hard to believe, not just that the position has changed, but that instead there's an appeasing or a capitulation to the demands of the aggressor, of Putin, who essentially changing the borders of Europe at a time when this has not happened in, in 80 years. After 80 years of peace on the European continent, we are now facing the biggest threat to European security since that time, since World War II. Now, why should we care about it? We should care about it because Europe is our biggest trading partner. It's the home of some of our most important allies who are working with us on any number of issues and problems and crises around the world. So it makes no sense for us to, you know, side with the aggressor on a moral, on a moral plane. But even more than that, in terms of our interests and our values, it makes no sense. And the danger we have is that China's stepping in, our adversaries are stepping in, because we are stepping back and siding with, with dictators and siding with autocrats. It's unthinkable, and it's again, the Reason why I spent my entire almost 30 years in the parts of Europe that are contested space, the young democracies of Europe. And the reason that I left the State Department, the reason that I left that job that I love so much and that I had done since I was in my 20s, was that I saw us becoming what some of these young countries are, which are weaker democracies. And I couldn't believe that that could be the situation with the United States. And the only way I thought to change it, I could not change it from the inside, was to step out and try to change it in a different way. And so, just so people know where I'm coming from, I'm running for Congress in mid Michigan for the 7th district to try to help flip a critical seat and also to help flip the House, because I think we need to have principled leaders in Washington who are solely focused on American interests, solely focused on delivering for the people of. Well, for me, my district, but also our state and our country in a way that helps make America the strongest country in the world, which I believe deeply. That's our tradition, and we need to keep building on it, not destroying it. And this is what I see is happening right now.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah.

[Tommy Vietor]

I mean, look at you. You were, you know, you're an ambassador. You had very senior jobs throughout the State Department, an extraordinary tenure of service, and you resigned because you couldn't in good conscience carry out this administration's foreign policy. And I think you could be. I would understand if you decided to take some time off or, you know, go into the private sector or write white papers for a think tank, but instead you decided to run for Congress.

[Jon Favreau]

Why?

[Tommy Vietor]

And what do you hope to accomplish in this next iteration of public service? Like, why did you. Why was it this running for this seat, the thing that inspired you to be your next step?

[Bridget Brink]

Yeah. Well, thanks. I mean, I felt compelled to do something because I had spent my life, you know, trying to build up the young democracies on the fringes of Europe and create better partners, stronger partners and allies for the United States and fighting essentially for freedom and democracy. That's what I spent almost 30 years doing, and very proud to do it. I was proud every single day that I represented our country working for five presidents and over a lifetime and a career. But it just seemed that I needed to find a way to do that. I feel like it's such a critical moment for us because the problems that I saw overseas, in terms of broken promises or doing things that did not reflect or advance our interests is exactly what I see happening at home. I'm a. A really proud Michigander. My family goes back in Michigan for six generations, and I decided to come home with my family. I have a husband and two kids and to run for Congress. And I think that that is a way to change the situation and change it in a way that advances U.S. interests, that actually helps to do what we promise to do. And in my district, it's all about the economy. It's all about how do you help make life more affordable. And what Trump is doing right now at, with regard to the reckless tariffs, it's making everything more expensive. With regard to the big ugly bill, it's threatening to take away health insurance from 25,000 people in my district, but also will increase the cost of life insurance for everybody else. So the actions that are being taken on a domestic, on the domestic front are also equally bad for the people of Michigan, the people of my district. And so I feel like we need truthfulness. We need correct facts. We need to make policy based on what actually is true and happening and ensure that we deliver. We need government to deliver so that people feel that government and have confidence in their political leadership, which must also be held accountable, no matter who it is, whether it's the President of the United States, the House leadership for any district or local representation. And everyone needs to be accountable for how they deal with taxpayer money and how they deliver.

[Tommy Vietor]

Well, Ambassador Brink, thank you for your decades of service in the State Department. Thank you for joining us today and providing insight on this cluster of a policy towards Ukraine. And best of luck in your campaign and really appreciate you doing the show.

[Bridget Brink]

Thank you. You can find me on bridgetbrink.com Thanks a lot, Tommy. It's great to see you. Thanks for having me.

[Jon Favreau]

That's our show for today. Thanks to Bridget Brink for coming on. Dan and I will be back with a new show on Friday.

[John Lovett]

We didn't even talk about the Melania letter.

[Tommy Vietor]

I think she's a force for good in this. I really do.

[Jon Favreau]

I also didn't.

[John Lovett]

I think Chappie chatgpt is a force.

[Tommy Vietor]

I think chatgpt wrote the letter, but I think. I think Melania is pushing Trump in a good direction.

[John Lovett]

Yo.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, yeah. We also forgot to talk about the flyover, but that's fine.

[Tommy Vietor]

Which part of the B.

[Jon Favreau]

The B2 bomber and how that was just a massive show.

[Tommy Vietor]

Yeah, they were. They're MAGA dudes just like, like losing their minds. Just rock hard over. I was like, guys, you think Putin's intimidated by that.

[Jon Favreau]

I'm fucking fucking over that.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, they were.

[Tommy Vietor]

Do you guys think Putin thinks that Trump's gonna bomb him and kill himself?

[John Lovett]

Gotta be the party.

[Jon Favreau]

This is a great coda. We should just put all this if you want to listen to Pod Save America ad free or get access to our subscriber discord and exclusive podcasts, consider joining our Friends of the podcast [e-mail] friends or subscribe on Apple Podcasts directly from the Pod Save America feed. Also, please consider leaving us a review to help boost this episode and everything we do here at Crooked. Pod Save America is a crooked media production. Our producers are David Toledo, Emma Ilik Frank and Saul Rubin. Our associate producer is Farah Safari. Austin Fisher is our senior producer. Reed Churlin is our executive editor. Adrian Hill is our head of news and politics. The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan Kanter is our sound engineer, with audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Matt de Groat is our head of production. Naomi Sengel is our executive assistant. Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Hayley Jones, Ben Hefcoat, Mia Kellman, Kiril Pelaviev, David Toles, and Ryan Young, our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East. Sam.